Page 52 of North

“Picton’s dead ahead,” Colbie said.

I glanced forward. Through the cockpit window, I spotted the circular walls of the town, which were all lit up. It vaguely looked like an old castle set in a wasteland of rubble.

Colbie flew over the walls, and I saw heavily-armed guards standing in one of the guard towers. They were on high alert. We landed on one of the landing pads inside.

As soon as we touched down, a group of three people strode toward us—two men and a woman.

We all climbed out of the Talon.

“I’m Jameson Steele, the leader of Hunter Squad,” Jameson said, holding out a hand.

The youngest man nodded. “I’m James Pitt, the leader of Picton. This is Arabella Spencer, our head of security.” The older woman nodded. “And Daniel Legge. He was on duty on the wall during the attack.”

I glanced at the dark-skinned man. He was probably my age. His head was wrapped in bandages.

“Tell us what happened,” Jameson asked.

Daniel swiped a shaky hand across his mouth. He still looked rattled. “Monsters attacked the west wall.”

“We’re doing some rehab work there and there was some scaffolding set up,” Arabella added. “They’d never paid any attention to it before.”

I sucked in a breath. The monsters were smart enough to aim for a weak spot.

“What kind of creatures?” Jess asked, pulling out her communicator and widening the screen. “Can you describe them?”

Daniel shook his head. “That’s the thing. It was a big mob of them, but they weren’t all alike. I mean, I’d seen packs of similar monsters before, but nothing like this.”

“Anything you can describe about them would help,” Jess said.

The man pulled in a shaky breath. “There were three different breeds. Some were big, walked on all fours, and had a long tail. Others walked on two feet, but I didn’t get a goodlook at those ones. The third type were small and fast, jumping everywhere. I reckon they had some possum in them. Never seen anything like it before.”

A cold chill skated through me. Jess blinked, then got busy taking notes.

“We managed to kill a few, but then they snatched some of the guards. They got Chris and Marina first. They killed Stefan.” A spasm crossed Daniel’s face. “Then they took Gus, Harry and Kitt. They retreated. Carried them away.”

Shit.

“Which direction?” Jameson asked.

Daniel rubbed the side of his head. “Um, north. They went north.”

“Okay, Daniel.” Jameson nodded. “We’re going to get your people back.”

“Please.” He grabbed Jameson’s arm. “They’re all good people.”

“We’ll bring them home,” Marc said.

“Thank you,” James said before his face crumpled. “Kitt’s my wife. Our three children are asleep, and I don’t know what I’m going to tell them when they wake up.”

Sympathy filled me. I wanted to reassure him, but I couldn’t make any promises that I couldn’t keep.

Jameson nodded and turned to face us. We jogged back to the quadcopter, and a second later, we were back in the air.

“We’re heading north, Colbie.” Jameson stayed standing, holding a handgrip above his head. “Sasha, I need you searching for heat signatures.”

“Acknowledged,” the comms officer replied. “We already have a drone in the air.”

“It was a group of monsters working together. They took the guards alive, so we’re working on the assumption that those humans are still breathing. Let’s find them.”

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